A Summary of Juan Cole’s
“The Baha’i Faith in America as Panopticon, 1963-1997”
Ian Kluge
Author’s note: The following summary is no substitute for reading the original in which Dr. Juan Cole, easily the most prominent, most capable and most vocal ex-Baha’i on the scene, presents the arguments that support the ideas outlined below.
For a critical dissection of Dr. Cole’s article, please
Go to "Panopticon"
The self-stated purpose of “Panopticon” is to examine the “social control mechanisms in the American Baha’i community”. The word ‘panopticon’ can refer to Jeremy Bentham’s description of a circular prison in which inmates are under visual supervision at all times to control their behavior and speech, or, it can refer to Michael Foucault’s description of every society as a panopticon in which people police themselves and each other.
Cole claims that the American Baha’i community is a panopticon but he soon destroys his own thesis. First, he fails to realize that the Baha’i Faith is a voluntary organization that people join freely and may leave at any time. It is impossible to establish a panopticon or any other kind of repressive organization when people can simply walk away from the control of authorities. Unlike Bentham and Foucault, Cole does not understand that panopticons require compulsory presence. Second, Cole fails to understand that one cannot create a panopticon or any other repressive structure by monitoring only a small number of people and giving “greater leeway” and freedom to the majority. Doing so encourages among the many ordinary believers the very rebellious attitudes one is trying to suppress among the few. Cole’s article rests on a foundation of intellectual sand.
According to Cole, the Baha’i Faith, which has deceiving journalists and the public by “projecting an image more liberal than the reality”, has been taken over by “anti-liberal” conservatives who have “captured key posts” and who “shape the community’s ideology subtly by controlling media and silencing intellectuals who have become prominent.” The Faith tries to control “vocal intellectuals, media and prominent institutions” by monitoring them closely but, at the same time giving “greater leeway” to ordinary believers so that they do not notice what is happening.
In the section entitled “Historical Background of the American Baha’i Community”, Cole briefly explains the line of succession and institutional development from Baha’u’llah to the Universal House of Justice and the Continental Boards of Counselors. The later, in his view, are charged with “encouraging proselytizing and imposing orthodoxy”. He admits the Faith has achieved “vast expansion in the global South” but notes growth is light in Europe.
Cole then describes the Faith’s American expansion as a result of social alienation in the 1960’s and 1970’s, paying particular attention to teaching in the South. By using selected e-mails and “personal communications”, Cole suggests that the decision to halt Southern teaching was motivated by racism. He also discusses the arrival of Iranian Baha’is after 1978, and not only accuses the elected Bahai ruling body, the Universal House of Justice, of “quietism” in face of the persecutions in Iran but also accuses it of being hostile to Iranian émigrés and even endangering their lives. Only the actions of the American NSA forced the Universal House to change its policies.
Cole dismisses the American NSA’s figure of 130,000 Baha’is, and, on the basis of insider information, attendance figures at Feasts, addresses, and anecdotes illustrating problems with addresses, concludes that the official number is “a vast exaggeration, even if one counts the children.” He seems to accept his insider’s figure of 60,000 “adults in good standing”.
In “Panopticon”, Cole details what he calls the “isolating beliefs and practices” of the Baha’i Administrative Order (BAO). Their purpose is to drive a wedge between Baha’is and their fellow citizens and even to form a highly negative and hostile attitude to the U.S. These practices include (1) sending Baha’is to pioneer abroad and to distant communities at home to make them dependent on the BAO; (2) isolating them from the rest of society by a ban on participation in partisan party politics; and (3) forbidding them participation in some civil organizations as Amnesty International.
In Cole’s view, the following beliefs are signs that the BAO has succeeded in isolating Baha’is from their fellow-citizens: (1) “their disparagement of the institutions and values of mainstream American society” as well as the Old World Order, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights; (2) their belief in the superiority of “their own community, values and procedures”; (3) their antagonism to existing American society” as expressed in the fact that some Baha’is believe in a “Calamity”; (4) the belief supposedly held by “many Baha’is” that eventually there will be a Baha’i theocracy like Iran’s which would deprive non-Baha’is of their civil rights; (5) the belief in the infallibility of the Universal House of Justice and (6) the supposedly wide-spread belief that Baha’is must “subordinate their individual consciences to UHJ [sic] decisions ands obey it implicitly”. He writes that “[b]elief in divine guidance makes Baha’is especially susceptible to authoritarian control techniques the part of Baha’i administrators.”
In the section entitled “Divine Elections”, Cole purports to show another way in which the BAO controls the Baha’i community. These control techniques include (1) the lack of formal nominations and campaigning for office; (2) the development of “informal mechanisms of nominations and campaigning”; (3) the requirement that Baha’is must support a majority vote after a subject has been debated which he calls “the silencing of defeated minorities”; and (4) the slow turn-over on the American NSA caused by a lack of term-limits. Cole claims that the exposure NSA members get in the course of their duties constitutes informal campaigning. He feels the ban on campaigning not only favors incumbents but also draws negative attention to “any active intellectual or any medium of communication not directly controlled by the NSA.” He is highly critical of the fact that Baha’i businesses dealing in ‘Baha’i materials’ operate under some degree of supervision from the NSA.
“Baha’i leaders employ a number of important control mechanisms to shape the speech and behavior of Baha’is. These include removal of voting rights, shunning [of covenant breakers], demands for conformity, accusations of “weakness in the covenant, ‘informing and surveillance, and various forms of censorship.” Ignoring even basic dictionary definitions, Cole tries to present pre-publication review as censorship, and uses the case of Dialogue magazine to illustrate his point. Dialogue’s “A Modest Proposal” which suggested, among other things, an end to pre-publication review and term limits, was shut down by its own editors. He feels that “cults of personality do grow up around Baha’i officials “ and that popular teachers inevitably under suspicion. Finally, he cites “administrative expulsion”, that is, simply “being dropped from the rolls. He cites the case of Canadian sci-fi writer Michael McKenny. He also uses the looseness with which some Baha’is employ the term “covenant-breaker” as evidence of an all-pervasive culture of repression. He believes that “informing [is] officially encouraged” and that there is a struggle between “conservatives” who read the Writings literally and “liberals” who do not. He believes that the Baha’i Faith is
opposed to human rights.
The evidence in Cole’s articles comes mainly from (a) about 6 personal communications either to Cole himself to forwarded to Cole by others; (b) personal memories from over 30 years ago; (c) about 10 e-mails from various list-servs; (d) a number of statistical reports relating to the number of Baha’is; and (e) his own experiences. He frequently uses generalizations such as “many Baha’is”, expecting readers to accept his claims at face value. None of the personal communications, e-mails reminiscences are corroborated, and the major statistical study from CUNY (City University of New York) is so bad it is over 200% off the number of American Baha’is for which the NSA has confirmed addresses. Anyone following the links to some of the personal communications will find that it is possible to read many of them differently than Cole does.
Cole’s article is not a reliable source of information about the Bahai Faith. Charitably put, it is, at best a ‘position paper’, that is, an academic paper intended to stir up controversy. The problem is that both he and the JSSR (Journal for the Scientific Study of religion) published it as an informational academic paper and in that way inadvertently or not, mislead their readers.
Ian Kluge may be contacted at [email protected]
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